


catch me if you can

by cosmicbees



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Drinking Games, Flirting, Frat Boy Keith, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-30
Updated: 2018-07-30
Packaged: 2019-06-18 16:25:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,981
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15489933
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cosmicbees/pseuds/cosmicbees
Summary: Shiro learns how to play drunk Jenga, and maybe gets a little more out of it than he had bargained for.“Shotgun!” Lance whoops joyfully, launching one of the small wooden bricks across the room towards where Shiro and Keith are positioned on the couch. Shiro shoots his left hand out to grab the projectile, the sudden movement threatening to dethrone Keith. In response, his right hand instantly settles on Keith’s waist in an attempt to hold him steady, and its impossible to miss the little hitch of breath when his fingers press into the flesh just below Keith’s ribs.“Yeah?” Shiro chuckles, holding out the little block in the palm of his hand. On the smooth wooden surface, there’s a small shotgun drawn crudely, with a bold, messy BANG! scrawled alongside it.“Yeah,” Keith agrees.





	catch me if you can

**Author's Note:**

> listen...i wrote half of this last spring in my cold war class instead of paying attention to a lecture about american foreign policy during reagan's presidency, so I'm sorry.

“I don’t understand why you want me to go to Lance’s party with you,” Shiro sighs, glancing up from where his coursework is sprawled out in front of him. Allura is perched on the edge of the dining room table, legs swinging as she leans forward to examine Shiro’s work. 

“He asked if you would come and I’d told him yes. He thinks a lot of you, you know?” She replies simply, reaching a finger out to tap against the paper in front of Shiro “this spot could use a bit more blending.”

“I know,” Shiro sighs, setting the pencil in his hand aside and reaching for a blending stump instead, “he’s nice and all, and I’m glad you like your boyfriend, but I just...I don’t really do parties.”

“It’s not like, a...real party,” Allura insists, watching as Shiro methodically works at the graphite on his paper, “It’s more of a kickback. With...most every member of Theta Gamma Rho.” 

Shiro hums in acknowledgement, eyes trained to the paper, “So its...a frat party?” 

Allura huffs, and reaches out to snatch the stump from his fingers, “Shiro, please? I’d promised Lance you’d come.” His eyes dart towards where she sits, head tilted inquisitively, and he takes a deep breath in before leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms defensively across his chest. Shiro sees the smile spreading across Allura’s face before he even opens his mouth in response. 

“Fine.” 

 

*****

 

“This is...not a kickback,” Shiro states, glaring at Allura as she turns back towards him. They’re standing on the sidewalk outside of a run-down house just a few blocks from campus, and the low  _ whump whump whump _ of the music seeping out of the screen door thrums through Shiro’s bones. The sheer number of people inside is clear by the blur of silhouettes on the windows, illuminated by pale yellow light against the night. Haphazardly hung string lights illuminate the brick of the entryway in lieu of a porch light. 

“Hey babe!” A sharp voice calls just as Allura is opening her mouth to reply, and she spins back towards the house--its a  _ goddamn beacon of sin _ . Lance is leaning against a support beam of the portico grinning, with a red cup in one hand, the other raised in greeting.

“You’ll have fun,” Allura replies over her shoulder, already making a beeline towards her boyfriend. Shiro follows slowly behind, accepting the cup that Lance shoves into his hands. 

“Shiro! My man!” Lance’s hand claps down on his back just as he moves to take a sip from the flimsy plastic cup, causing the contents to slosh over the sides and down Shiro’s front. “Oh, Shit. Sorry dude.” 

“No, you’re good,” Shiro mutters, brushing a hand down the front of his sweater, “Not a big deal.” 

“Alright,” Lance shrugs, wrapping an arm around Allura’s shoulders and pulling her in close, “If you want, there’s a keg downstairs with your name on it.” 

“Yeah, thanks.” Shiro nods, and the couple slips out of sight and into the throng of people just inside the door. 

The second Shiro steps foot in the house he is struck by scene around him. The air is thick and stale with the scent of beer, and there are groups of people huddled together tightly. Even in the dim lighting, Shiro can see the sad state of the house around him. It doesn’t look as though the floors have ever been cleaned, the couches and chairs spread throughout the living space are dilapidated and threadbare, and the few mismatched throw pillows are fraying on the edges. At least there are throw pillows, he notes. It’s a touch of hominess that Shiro hadn’t expected. The kitchen is no better, with yellow, aging linoleum floors that are peeling in the corners, and a stack of dishes sitting in a sink, half-filled with murky grey water. 

When Shiro finally makes his way into the basement he finds a rickety beer pong table smack dab in the center of the room with a ruckus of people crowded around it. In the corner sits a keg, manned by a guy in a bright yellow headband who smiles brightly at each person that comes up to him, handing over cup after cup of what Shiro presumes to be lukewarm Coors Light. There’s a couch just to the left of the keg, on which a couple rests, locked together in a passionate embrace. Shiro looks down into the cup that Lance had passed to him earlier,  swirling the suspicious blue liquid inside. 

It’s only about half full, so he downs the whole thing in one go. 

Shiro’s eyes start to burn, and he immediately regrets...well...everything. The cup was filled with something cloyingly sweet and a little fruity that bites at the back of Shiro’s throat, and he throws himself to the couch spluttering and coughing. 

“Hey man,” Yellow Headband Guy is eyeing Shiro, concern on his face, “you okay?” Shiro can only nod, wiping tears from his eyes, “Can I...help you somehow?” 

“Got any water in there?” Shiro croaks, gesturing loosely towards the keg

“Nah,” Headband guy shakes his head, a little forlorn, before waving the nozzle towards Shiro, “but I’ve got Bud Light.”

It’ll have to do, so Shiro thrusts his empty cup towards the man, and nods his thanks when it’s returned to him a short moment later, filled to the brim. 

“I’m Hunk, by the way,” proclaims Yellow Headband Guy-- _ Hunk _ , Shiro reminds himself. 

“Shiro,” he replies, holding the cup up in a small salute, and takes a sip. It’s definitely lukewarm, but at least it’s not Coors, so Shiro drinks more in an attempt to cleanse the syrupy sweetness of blue raspberry from his mouth. 

 

*****

 

“Hey! Hey Shiro!” Shiro’s head turns towards the source of his name, pulling his gaze from where it has been glued to the beer pong table for an undetermined amount of time. Lance is fast on the approach, eyes wild. “I’ve been looking for you for  _ forever _ !” 

“I’ve been here the whole time,” Shiro replies, cocking his head lazily towards where Hunk has been settled against the wall, scrolling through his phone, “ask Hunk.” 

“True,” confirms Hunk, refusing to break eye contact with the screen in front of him. 

“Well enough of this, come hang out with the cool kids!” Lance’s words are slurring, and he crouches in front of where Shiro is still sprawled on the sofa, reaching out to steady himself with a hand on Shiro’s knee. 

“Yeah? Do the cool kids usually give people cups filled to the brim with straight UV Blue and not tell them?” 

“It wasn’t UV blue,” Lance closes his eyes, and Shiro has a brief moment of fear that Lance is going to throw up, before he unexpectedly throws his head back in a burst of laughter, “It’s jungle juice, man. Keith made it! It’s good, huh?” 

Shiro narrows his eyes in response, and shakes his head slowly “I thought I’d been handed a cup of acid.” 

“Don’t be such a stick in the mud, dude,” Lance is already standing back up, perched on wobbly legs, and gestures towards the stairway, “we’re gonna play Drunk Jenga. Hunk’s even gonna come. Right, Hunk?” Hunk nods, glancing up from his phone at last. 

“What?” Shiro is baffled by the idea, “What is Drunk Jenga?”

The only response he earns from Lance is a wicked grin. 

 

*****

 

Drunk Jenga, as it turns out, is a mistake as far as Shiro’s concerned--the product of men blinded by hubris. Part drinking game and part coordination test for the inebriated, the entire thing, Shiro decides before the game even begins, is destined to end up in a shit show. 

“Okay, so it’s just like regular Jenga,” Lance explains animatedly during his third attempt to stack the blocks without toppling them over. “But you have to do what the brick says!” 

“What the brick says?” The confusion on Shiro’s face must be evident, because Hunk cuts in. 

“Every block has a phrase or a drawing on it, and those stand for actions. So if you get the ‘Take One,’ tile, you’ll have to take one drink. We’ve got a sheet around somewhere that has the rules and a key for what each block means, for the uninitiated.” 

Shiro’s first instinct is to bristle at being considered a member of ‘the uninitiated,’ but a blur of movement in his peripherals redirects his attention. In a flash, Lance has sprung up from his perch on the edge of a ragged armchair beside Allura, and is attempting to wrestle the newcomer to the room into a headlock. The ensuing scuffle draws the attention of nearly the entire room, which now houses considerably fewer people than it had at the beginning of the evening, and ends in a fit of raucous laughter from Lance, who finds himself the unsuspecting recipient of a headlock himself. 

“Good to see you, buddy,” Lance gives a quick tap on the arm holding him, “I knew you’d come out of your hole eventually--your juice has been a hit all night.”

It’s in that quick series of events that Shiro feels his heart drop straight to the pit of his stomach--the arm around Lance’s neck is attached to the most beautiful person that Shiro has ever seen. 

“I figured I should pay a visit to my loyal subjects,” the man responds, releasing Lance from his stranglehold, “I heard you’ve got a game of Jenga going?” 

“Yeah,” Hunk pipes up this time, reaching out a hand in greeting, “We’re about to get started if you want to join in, Keith.” 

_ Keith _ . 

The most beautiful man that Shiro has ever seen is standing before him in a pastel pink polo, and his name is Keith. 

Shiro thinks he might already bordering on drunk, if the white noise that erupts in his head when Hunk states the other man’s name is anything to go by. Keith gives the small gathering around the rickety coffee table a onceover, eyeing the participants appraisingly, before he looks in Shiro’s direction. Their eyes meet for a brief moment and Keith gives Shiro a quick once over and a smirk. 

Shiro knows for sure that he has actually entirely crossed the border into being drunk, because the white noise in his ears is now accompanied by a loop of Keith saying “I can do that,” as he settles on to the opposite end of the couch, just feet from where Shiro is sitting, dumbstruck. Hunk launches back into his explanation of the semantics of Drunk Jenga without missing a beat.

Shiro’s gaze is fixed on the tower of wooden bricks in front of him, steadfast, as he tries to tune out everything but Hunk’s instructions. Shiro can feel Keith’s eyes boring into him from across the sofa, however, and when he turns to face him, the noise in the back of his head grows loud again, drowning out any hope he had of fully understanding the game. Keith looks small in the space, with his legs pulled up and tucked beneath him, and Shiro raises his hand in an uncoordinated wave. The smug look on Keith’s face softens into something unreadable, and he waves in response; a tide of warmth washes over Shiro’s body.

Shiro’s earlier prediction of the game turning into a disaster is quickly realized. The first round alone sees everyone taking multiple shots, the second round signals the arrival of Hunk’s friend, a small girl named Pidge who seems entirely too sober for the occasion, and the third round commences the most chaotic five minutes of Shiro’s life. 

“Strip one,” Allura laughs while triumphantly reaching behind her back to unclasp her bra, before handing it to Lance, who looks both delighted and mortified when Pidge reaches across Hunk to high-five Allura. 

Hunk is sworn to silence by a tile which reads: ‘Sue Rule.’

“Sue Rule,” Pidge reads from the sheet, handed to her by a morose Hunk, “in which the player must drink once for every word spoken for the remainder of the game.” 

Shiro pulls a brick from the precarious tower, careful to not disrupt it too much. “The punishment for knocking the Jenga tower over,” Lance had explained before the game began, “is to chug a beer, and take a shot.”

Quite frankly, Shiro isn’t sure his liver could survive the experience .

“What does Santa mean?” Shiro asks, eyeing the block in his hand suspiciously. The tiny, poorly drawn Santa Claus on it leers up at him, knowingly. There’s a snicker from Lance, and Shiro’s eyes shoot up, “Seriously, what does the Santa block mean?”

“The person whose turn it is next has to take their turn while sitting in your lap.” Allura answers, passing the rule sheet to him. There’s a huff of laughter to his left, and he snaps his head to the side, where Keith has been curled up silently for the duration of the game so far. The other boy’s mouth is twisted into a mischievous grin as he stands up, stalking towards Shiro, and--oh  _ god _ is he wearing boat shoes? 

Shiro opens his mouth to comment on his choice in footwear, but before he can formulate a cognizant sentence, Keith’s hands are pressing into his shoulders as he climbs into position. Settling back on his haunches, Keith pulls one of his hands from Shiro’s shoulders and presses it against his thighs where they straddle Shiro’s lap. 

“Hey Lance,” Keith calls, loud enough to be heard without moving to face the other boy, “grab me a Jenga piece, would you?”

“I really don’t think that’s--”

“Grab me a piece, Lance,” Keith interrupts him, calmly, all the while refusing to break eye contact with Shiro, who can feel the flush spreading across his face.

Shiro wishes he could sink into the couch cushions, never to be seen again, because he never thought he’d find himself in this position. There’s a boy wearing boat shoes pinning Shiro to a ratty sofa with one hand, a smirk painted across his face and dark hair curling just above the collar of a godawful pink Vineyard Vines polo--and Shiro  _ likes it.  _ Even through the haze of cheap liquor and warm beer that clouds his mind, Shiro is acutely aware of every part of Keith’s body that is pressed to his own. 

“Shotgun!” Lance whoops joyfully, launching one of the small wooden bricks across the room towards where Shiro and Keith are positioned on the couch. Shiro shoots his left hand out to grab the projectile, the sudden movement threatening to dethrone Keith. In response, his right hand instantly settles on Keith’s waist in an attempt to hold him steady, and its impossible to miss the little hitch of breath when his fingers press into the flesh just below Keith’s ribs. 

“Yeah?” Shiro chuckles, holding out the little block in the palm of his hand. On the smooth wooden surface, there’s a small shotgun drawn crudely, with a bold, messy  _ BANG! _ scrawled alongside it. 

“Yeah,” Keith agrees. The hand that isn’t pressed into Shiro’s shoulder is already thrust out expectantly, and within seconds, Hunk is dutifully pressing a can of Natural Light, and a churchkey into Keith’s palm. It’s only then that Shiro understands the implications of the small firearm on the Jenga tile he holds. 

Keith’s about to shotgun a fucking Natty Light, and Shiro has a front row seat. 

Shiro doesn’t have time to fully process the sudden absence of warmth against his shoulder before Keith is shoving the tip of churchkey in to the bottom edge of the can, popping the tab and draining the entire beer in about five seconds flat. Keith simply hands the empty can back to Hunk, who shouts his approval alongside Lance, before settling his palm flat against Shiro’s chest. 

If Shiro were a stronger man, he’d ignore the dull  _ tha-thump _ of his heart against Keith’s hand. If Shiro were a stronger man, he might even be able to ignore the insignificant droplet of beer that rests just on the line of Keith’s lower lip. If Shiro were a stronger man, he would definitely ignore the heady weight of Keith pressed against his thighs. And the look Keith is giving him? 

That look feels like a challenge. 

As it stands, Shiro is a weak man, and instead of ignoring everything about the person perched in his lap, he lets the drunken, hazy part of his brain take over. 

Against his better judgement, Shiro reaches out, and runs the pad of his thumb along the fullest part of Keith’s lower lip. Keith freezes under his touch, eyes locking with Shiro’s. 

“Shit, I’m sorry,” Shiro immediately pulls his hand back, as though he’s been burned by the other man’s mouth, and Keith levels him with a look he can’t identify. 

“You’re fine,” he responds, pressing his fingers firmly against where they’re still planted just above Shiro’s heart, and using it as leverage to push himself to his feet. In a split second he’s already halfway across the room, leaving the gathering behind, and announcing to no one in particular, “I need a cigarette.”

Shiro feels the hot burn of everyone’s eyes on him, and he wrenches his gaze away from where Keith had disappeared a moment before. 

“Dude,” Hunk finally says after a wave of silence passes over the room, “are you okay?”

Shiro nods, ignoring Lance’s indignant squawk when he demands that Hunk drink as a punishment for speaking. He is unsure if his head is spinning from the alcohol, or from the ghost of Keith’s thighs pressing against his own, but he moves nonetheless. “Yeah, I just need some water.” 

On wobbly legs, Shiro manages to find a clean cup in the kitchen--it is a rinsed out, reused Big Gulp cup with faded printing, but it is clean nonetheless. Even over the running water, Shiro can hear an argument brewing between Lance and Hunk about whether a game of drunk Jenga can continue sans two of its participants. Taking a shuddering breath in, he manages to slip past the gathering in the living room unnoticed, and out the back door. 

The patio is draped in the same multicolored string lights as the front porch, strung along the eaves and casting a soft array of light on the patchy grass in the backyard. The music filtering from the windows has died down now that many of the party-goers have left, and the space seems blessedly quiet after the din of the house. Shiro hears a low  _ crunch _ just to his left, and he turns on his heels towards the noise.

Keith grins at him from the shadows of the wall just under where light bleeds from a window, “Hey. Didn’t mean to scare you.” 

Shiro furrows his brows in confusion. His brain feels muddy, waterlogged when he says “I thought you went out front?” 

“I did,” The other man chirps in agreement, “but there were people out there. I wanted some privacy.”

Shiro tilts his head towards the door he’d stepped out of barely a minute before. An unspoken question. 

“No, you’re good,” Keith murmurs, shaking his head, before he reaches into his back pocket and procures a small box. He holds it out to Shiro, “want one?” 

Shiro squints at it, and wrinkles his nose, “Marlboro Reds?”

“If I’m going to let these things kill me, I’d like to commit to it.” Keith laughs upon looking up at Shiro’s expression of disgust. Shiro’s face relaxes into a soft smile at that, and he accepts the offering, holding the cigarette between his lips and reaching for Keith’s proffered lighter. Keith’s grip tightens on it for a brief moment, “If you’d rather, I’ve got a pretty decent joint tucked in here instead.”

Shiro pauses, locked in consideration. “I think I’ll stick to the cigarette for now,” he concedes after a long moment. Keith hums and releases the lighter for Shiro before sitting down on the edge of the concrete stairs leading to the house. After a spell, he tilts his chin up to look at Shiro, and pats the step beside where he is seated--an invitation which Shiro happily accepts.. They rest, in silence, while Shiro nurses his cigarette and water a few feet away from where Keith is leaning back onto his elbows, eyes cast towards the night sky. 

“Wait,” Keith finally says, glancing over, “I still don’t know your name.” 

“I’m Takashi, but you can call me Shiro.” 

Keith pauses, and turns to face Shiro, pulling a knee up to his chest, and wrapping his arms around the drawn-up leg. He leans forward after a moment of silence, and asks, “Can I call you Takashi, instead?” 

The question takes Shiro by surprise. Takashi is a name he hears only from his grandparents, or, on the odd occasion, his mother--his friends have only ever known him by his nickname. He looks over at Keith, and is met by wide, deep blue eyes looking back at him in earnest; something warm settles at the base of Shiro’s spine. “Yeah,” he affirms, “you can call me Takashi.” 

Keith’s lips quirk up at the corner, “cool,” He’s reaching back into his pocket for the cigarette carton and pulling what Shiro assumes to be the joint he’d mentioned earlier from the little cardboard box; his suspicions are confirmed a moment later when the familiar, acrid tang of marijuana hits his nostrils. 

“Are you sure you don’t want any?” Keith inquires, holding it out to him. 

Shiro is thoughtful, quiet for a minute, but accepts it as he asks, “so what’s with the show you were putting on earlier?” 

Keith snorts out a laugh, and shrugs, but he shifts a bit closer to Shiro before tilting his head back to look up at the sky once again. 

Shiro watches him for a long while, and the two of them pass the joint back and forth, until it burns down to nothingness. Keith blinks slowly, steadily as his eyes trace the stars overhead, his face cast in pale shades of pink and green from the string lights overhead. 

“Looking at constellations?” Shiro asks. The words fall clumsily from his tongue, but Keith nods anyway. Shiro pauses, before scooting across the cement step to sit beside Keith. He reaches an arm up, pointing to an indistinct spot in the sky, “this one’s my favorite, Orion--the hunter.”

Keith says nothing, but hums his acknowledgement. Shiro is acutely aware of the warm press of Keith’s side against his own in the chill of the night air, and he puts a hand down just behind Keith to steady himself as he leans in closer, “he’s following those little ones, the seven sisters--they’re also called the Pleiades, across the sky.” 

“Hey Takashi,” Keith finally says, voice quiet, “remember when you asked what show I was putting on?” He is leaned in close to Shiro, and when Shiro glances down to lock eyes with him their faces are mere inches apart. 

“Yeah?” 

The same playful smirk that he had worn earlier in the evening shoots across Keith’s face again, and he brushes his lips along the edge of Shiro’s jaw, “do you wanna find out?”

Shiro nods, numb, barely registering the press of Keith’s lips before he’s pulled in closer, Keith’s mouth hungry against his own. 

It’s not until later, when Shiro’s eyes shoot open as Keith places a searing hot bite to his hipbone, two fingers buried deep inside him, that he notices the smattering of glow-in-the-dark plastic stars affixed to Keith’s ceiling. They’re dim, barely luminescent in the dark of the room, but Shiro can still make out the shape of a hunter chasing a tiny cluster of seven pale pink stars before his eyes flutter shut. 

**Author's Note:**

> Is there an entire canon to this frat boy au worked out in my head? yes.
> 
> Will anything ever come of it? Who knows!
> 
> come say hi on [tumblr](http://patienceyieldslove.tumblr.com/) or [twitter](https://twitter.com/sheithinlove) sometime!


End file.
